FatKidsLie

When I was in 4th grade I, along with a few of the more famous trouble-makers in my class made a substitute teacher cry. I also believe that she decided to quit teaching and re-evaluate her career path. I don’t know that the second part ACTUALLY happened, but I like to believe it did.

Mrs. Rosenberg was out one day for a batmitzvah for one of her cats and the school pulled a newly graduated girl as the substitute. I remember thinking that she was young… looked like my friend’s sister (who I had a 4th grade fatboy crush on). She was the first girl I’d ever seen with a nose-ring. She was one of those newwave discopunks that became teachers so they could be “cool” teachers like Welcome Back Kotter, but are really pathetic and useless like Gabe Kaplan.

And school is prison. If you show any weakness you’re gonna be somebody’s bitch. She became our collective bitch.

It started innocently enough too. You know that organized book-drop prank? Where everyone drops a textbook all at the same time? We weren’t THAT well organized. We kept dropping books, pencils, threw rulers at the blackboard. All the normal annoying crap that kids do. While this annoyed her she’d only stare at us and ask us how she could help us “be good little boys and girls”.

So John Walters told her how: “YOU CAN SUCK MY NUTS!!!” which led to applause from the students in the back row. You see, my class was something like the classroom scene from The Forbidden Zone. Complete with gunfights and sing-alongs. Mrs Rosenberg knew how to handle us. But this girl? No such luck!

If she had been more like my sister, Suzan (“… yer cruizin’ fer a bruisin…”), she’d’ve been alright. But alas, the smell of fear was in the water. And our 9-year-old brains turned that into a signal to attack:

It started with a steady stream of bathroom passes. We’d all go, get the pass, make noise going through the door, make noise coming back through the door, slam the pass down… Repeat. I think I went to the bathroom 3 times?

Then when asked to do a math problem on the blackboard, Sean Haggarty decided that 45÷9= a picture of a giant penis and balls. with a smiley face on the balls. He was trying to draw a silly poofy mushtash on it, but she had him return to his seat before he was done.

During our morning “reading time”, Michael DeSantos decided that he was going to get naked. Our sub tried using psychology on him by saying that she’s not impressed by bad behavior and that his being naked was nothing that she hadn’t seen before. His response? “Have you seen this before?” and he pissed an arc across his desk. All while holding a copy of his book.

He got to go home for that. Our assistant principal put us all on warning. Now, we liked this guy. So we told him that we’d be good. We didn’t want him to have to watch us or anything. And we were good, until lunch.

Lunch that day consisted of burgers and tater-tots. Greasy, slimy, cold, undercooked, expired tater-tots. The kind that only grade-school cafeterias can get away with serving.

My friend, Tim, and I piled everyone’s tots on our trays. Mixed in some Ketsup. FILLED our mouths with the grossness. Sat on either side of the substitute. And in unison spit the tots/ketsup grossness onto the table. Our classmates approved.

I think that was the final straw. She burst out into tears, grabbed all her hippy stuff and ran out of the building.

FINALLY! We had won!

Our assistant principal took over the class for the rest of the day. For the life of me, I don’t know why we didn’t get calls home about this. Maybe because it was the entire class? Maybe because he secretly hated hippies or new-wave discopunks? Or whatever the crap she was?

I don’t know. All I know is that we never saw her again. I kind of wonder what happened to her, but not really.

It was 1986. Ronald Regan was president. The Smurfs were all over the place. I was 6.

I was at Suzan’s (as in who you’re cruizin’ for a bruzin’ from… AKA my big sister) house while my mom and our dad (Suzan’s my paternal half sister and is like.. 30 years older than me) drank coffee on a Saturday morning. This was back in the golden days of Saturday Morning Cartoons, where you could wake up at 6am, get a bowl of sugar cerial, sit down in front of the TV and be babysat for 6 hours by Smurfs, Mon-Chi-Chis and every other sick cartoon that was awesome.

My niece (who is a year and a day older than me) and I were watching The Smurfs and drawing robots and dinosaurs and flowers and fairies etc in the living room. Hopped up on OJ and half a box of Cap’n Crunch, I went and hid behind the couch, took off my pants, folded them and took a blue magic marker to my wiener, jumped out in front of the TV and screamed “I’M A SMURF!!! LA LA LALALALA… LA LALA LA LAAAA (AKA the SMURF SONG)”

This freaked out my niece so much that she couldn’t scream. I then ran into the kitchen to show my parents and sister who didn’t have a sense of humor for that sort of crap. They all took turns beating my 6 year old ass.

The magic marker didn’t come off with regular soap and water, so my mom made me use AJAX. out in the driveway. So the whole world could see.

My neighborhood has a superhero. Or heroine. Depending on your/its definitions and declarations.

I know that the previous paragraph is more than a little confusing but bear with me…

Lately my neighborhood has had a protector. Just like Artie, the strongest man in the world. Only slightly more mutant and also transsexual.

This is a transvestite. Pre-op. Usually with a couple days worth of stubble, wearing hot-pink lipstick, smoking a giant Philly Blunt cigar down to the nub. Looks like a tranny version of Clint Eastwood meets Iggy Pop at a Revlon convention. And goes by the name… “Shaquana”.

Shaquana’s been out on patrol, sitting on the corner bench, or in front of the coffee shop, with a notebook jotting down observations and making sure that the whole block is safe.

Like our own personal superhero.

The police have branded Shaquana as a domestic terrorist. Which is unfortunate since she is only trying to make the world a better place.

The other morning Shaquana was in full effect. There were some kids waiting for the schoolbus acting like roughnecks. Banging street signs, and gates and throwing rocks into traffic. Shaquana leaped into action! She took a Supersoaker and sprayed down those kids. I don’t know what was in the Supersoaker buuuut…. the police were called in and went searching for her.

Then there was the time when she was in a dumpster and some hipster kids came out of the bar on the corner and one started to take a leak right there in the middle of the alleyway! She jumped out with her flashlight and made him stop! And piss down the leg of his pants. For sanitary reasons. She then sprayed them with a Supersoaker full of soapy water. And ran off.

Nobody can catch her. She can run fast. And has cloaking powers. Kind of like a cross between the Shadow and Batman. But mixed with some classy style.

Sometimes Shaquana hangs out in the alleyway between the wine/cheese shop and the hipster cafe. Searching for clues. In the garbage. She tried to pay for a cup of coffee with old pork lomein. Because on her planet that is currency. But not here.

Don’t blame her for all the weirdness surrounding her. Because it is REALLY hard to understand the norms and taboos of other cultures that live on your own planet let alone a backwater planet in the boondocks of the outer rim of the galaxy. There’s a learning curve. Like if I were to go into South America and try to make arrowheads. Sure, I can program a computer to sort through gene types looking for a way to cross breed a frog and a chicken but damned if i can bash two rocks together to get something useful.

And that’s what our highest level of technology is to the Purple Space Dragons (Shaquana’s true form). Banging rocks together and hoping for the best.